Hicks trained with al-Qaeda but tried to leave after 2001 terrorist
attacks

Page Tools

Alleged terrorist David Hicks has told the Australian Federal
Police that he met Osama bin Laden and trained with al-Qaeda, but
was horrified by the September 11, 2001, attacks and could not
leave Afghanistan because the border was shut by the Taliban.

The new details of the Adelaide man's activities in Afghanistan
come as his father, Terry, alleged Hicks was anally raped and
subjected to lengthy beatings by Americans while on board a United
States Navy vessel.

The fresh details of the Guantanamo Bay inmate's saga were aired
last night by the ABC's Four Corners program and come before
his trial this month before a controversial US military court.

According to the transcript of his interview with the AFP while
in Guantanamo Bay, Hicks admitted that he said he did courses in
basic training, guerilla tactics, urban warfare and intelligence
gathering while in the al-Qaeda camp in Afghanistan.

Although in correspondence to his family Hicks had boasted he
met bin Laden 20 times, he told the AFP he saw him on eight
occasions and met him once.

But he insisted he was appalled by the 2001 attacks on New York
and Washington, which he watched while in Pakistan, and wanted to
go back home.

"It's not Islam, is it," he said of the attacks. "It's like the
opposite of what I wanted to do."

Instead of leaving immediately for Australia, Hicks said he made
the fateful decision to return to an al-Qaeda guesthouse in
Kandahar to fetch his bags, clothes and birth certificate, which
had been left there.

The Afghanistan border soon closed and the Taliban was hunting
foreign spies as the US prepared for retaliatory strikes.

Hicks told the AFP he had to help the Taliban or be booted out
on the street, to his great peril. According to his account, he sat
in a trench with a gun and did nothing for a week. He was then
asked to guard a tank.

"There was no defending, there was no fighting, there was
nothing happening," Hicks said.

"I didn't see myself as assisting them, the al-Qaeda. Basically,
I was stuck where I was. There wasn't much I could do about
it."

As the Taliban crumbled amid the US-led onslaught, Hicks fled
and was picked up at a taxi station. He says he was sold to the
Americans for $1000 by the Northern Alliance.

He was soon taken by helicopter to the USS Peleliu, where his
father says he was badly mistreated. The Herald revealed
last year claims that Hicks was savagely beaten, but Mr Hicks snr
said the abuse went further.

He told Four Corners that his son had a number of objects
inserted into his anus against his will, and was also given
injections.

Mr Hicks said his son told him Americans meted out the
treatment, which also allegedly included two 10-hour beatings.